Totopia Brewery

Totopia Brewery. Its representative, Junya Morita, was born in 1987 in Toyokawa, Aichi Prefecture, and at age 27 he launched the beer pub BRICK LANE in Fushimi, Nagoya.

After that, he published a free magazine called "Kurashi to Beer," traveled to the U.S. many times to connect with local brewers, and in 2017 even started importing craft beer himself. Then, through meeting makers on the ground, he decided he wanted to brew his own beer, and in 2022 he opened a brewery in Nagakute.

Nagakute is actually the municipality with the youngest average age of residents in Japan. It also has Ghibli Park. He was drawn to a lush roughly 600-square-meter site there, and with support from a local liquor store, he decided to go for it. The name is a coined word combining "Touto" and "utopia."

Here’s the thing: they’re all named with "~phobia." Fangphobia is a hazy oat cream IPA that uses three hops, Peacharine, Citra Cryo, and Citra, for a juicy aroma of apricot and pineapple. Sirenphobia is an Oat Cream DIPA at ABV 8.0%, with green-apple fruitiness and a dank note.

Keyphobia is a DDH Hazy IPA at ABV 6.0%. Multiphobia is a fruit sour IPA with guava, mango, and peach, plus brown sugar and even cinnamon, making for a complex flavor. Their four pillars are Hazy IPA, Oat Cream IPA, Sour IPA, and West Coast Lager, and they keep improving precision each time by changing the hops and yeast.

Exactly, they really push the envelope. They also run a circular business model by supplying spent malt to the local JA so it can be used in agriculture. The taproom is open on weekends and always has eight beers on tap. They run it together as a married couple, with his wife, Akiko.